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Table of Contents

 

1 – Reading the World

2 – Thinking about Literature

3 – Thinking about Rhetoric and Argument

4 – Thinking about Synthesis

5 – Identity and Society

What does "identity" mean? ● How is one’s identity formed? ● How do personal experiences affect our identity? ● To what extent does school emphasize conformity at the expense of individuality?

Central Text

George Orwell, Shooting an Elephant (nonfiction)

Conversation:

Changes and Transformations

1. Jon Krakauer, The Devil’s Thumb (nonfiction)
2. Caitlin Horrocks, Zolaria (fiction)
3. Sharon Olds, My Son The Man and The Possessive (poetry)
4. William Shakespeare, Seven Ages of Man (poetry/drama)
5. James Joyce, Eveline (fiction)

Conversation:

The Individual in School

1. Alexandra Robbins, from The Geeks Shall Inherit the Earth (nonfiction)
2. Faith Erin Hicks, from Friends with Boys (graphic novel)
3. John Taylor Gatto, Against School (nonfiction)
4. Horace Mann, from The Common School Journal (nonfiction)
5. Theodore Sizer, from Horace’s School: Redesigning the American High School (nonfiction)
6. Maya Angelou, from I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (memoir)

1. The Carlisle Indian Boarding School (photographs)

Reading Workshop – Point of View in Narrative

Writing Workshop – Writing a Narrative

　

6 – Ambition and Restraint

What drives individuals to succeed? ● What are the benefits and dangers associated with ambition? ● Is ambition an innate or learned human trait? ● What causes people to rebel? ● Is violent resistance ever justified? ● How do speakers inspire others to act?

Central Text

William Shakespeare, Macbeth (drama)

Conversation:

Risk and Reward

1. W.H. Auden, Musee des Beaux Arts (poetry)
2. William Carlos Williams, Landscape with The Fall of Icarus (poetry)
3. Brian Aldiss, Flight 063 (poetry)
4. Jeffrey Kluger, from Ambition: Why Some people Are Most Likely to Succeed (nonfiction)
5. Percy Bysshe Shelley, Ozymandias (poetry)
6. William Shakespeare, Cardinal Wolsey’s Speech from Henry VIII (drama)
7. Amy Tan, Rules of the Game (fiction)
8. Miguel Cervantes, from Don Quixote (fiction)

Conversation:

Voices of Rebellion

1. Martin Luther King Jr., I’ve Been to the Mountaintop (speech)
2. Nelson Mandela, from An Ideal for Which I am Prepared to Die (speech)
3. Thomas Paine, from Common Sense (broadside)
4. Malala Yousafzai, Speech to the United Nations Youth Assembly
5. Carrie Chapman Catt, Address to the Congress on Women’s Suffrage
6. George Orwell, from Animal Farm (fiction)

　

Reading Workshop – Analyzing Figurative Language

Writing Workshop – Writing a Persuasive Argument

7 – Ethics

● How do we tell "right" from "wrong"? ● Can there be a universal understanding of what is "right" or "wrong"? ● To what extent do age, culture, and other factors affect our ethical decisions? ● When making ethical decisions, whose needs should be most important? The individual’s, other people’s, the larger society’s? ● What causes us to cheat? Is cheating always wrong? Who gets to define "cheating"?

Central Text

Michael Sandel, from The Case Against Perfection (nonfiction)

Conversation:

Do the Right Thing

1. Gabriel García Márquez, A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings (fiction)
2. Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Cell One (fiction)
3. Nathan Englander, Free Fruit for Young Widows (fiction)
4. John Updike, A & P (fiction)
5. William Stafford, Traveling Through the Dark (poetry)
6. Wisława Szymborska, A Contribution to Statistics (poetry)
7. Annie Dillard, An American Childhood (memoir)
8. Sam Harris, from Lying (nonfiction)

Conversation:

The Cheating Culture

1. Robert Kolker, Cheating Upwards (nonfiction)
2. Chuck Klosterman, Why We Look the Other Way (nonfiction)
3. Christopher Bergland, Cheaters Never Win (nonfiction)
4. Brad Allenby, Is Human Enhancement Cheating? (nonfiction)
5. Mia Consalvo, Cheating is Good For You (nonfiction)
6. David Callahan, from The Cheating Culture (nonfiction)
7. The Ethics of Photo Manipulation (photographs)

　

Reading Workshop – Argument by Analogy

Writing Workshop – Writing a Synthesis Essay

　

8 – Cultures in Conflict

What defines "culture"? ● How does someone become part of or leave a culture? ● What causes cultures to come in conflict with each other? ● Who gets to tell the story of a conflict? ● How do cultures respond to change and to outsiders? ● What is lost and gained by assimilation into a new culture?

　

Central Text

Julie Otsuka, from When the Emperor Was Divine (fiction)

Conversation:

Stories of War

1. Kamila Shamsie, from The Storytellers of Empire (nonfiction)
2. Wilfred Owen, Dulce Et Decorum Est (poetry)
3. William Shakespeare, St. Crispin’s Day Speech (drama)
4. Vu Bao, The Man Who Stained his Soul (fiction)
5. Katey Schultz, Deuce Out (fiction)
6. Kevin Sites, from In the Hot Zone (nonfiction)
7. Brian Turner, 2000 lbs. (poetry)
8. Karim Ben Khelifa, My Enemy, Myself (photo essay)

Conversation:

Displacement and Assimilation

1. Jean de Crevecoeur, from Letters from an American Farmer (nonfiction)
2. Anna Quindlen, Quilt of a Country (nonfiction)
3. Li-Young Lee, For a New Citizen of these United States (poetry)
4. Nola Kambanda, My New World Journey (nonfiction)
5. Amit Majmudar, Dothead (poetry)
6. Maira Kalman, from And the Pursuit of Happiness (graphic essay)

Reading Workshop – Analyzing Character and Theme

Writing Workshop – Writing a Thematic Interpretation

　

9 – (Mis)Communication

What factors lead to effective or ineffective communication between people? ● What role does culture play in effective and ineffective communication? ● How do changes in technologies affect how we communicate?

Central Text

Edmond Rostand, Cyrano de Bergerac (drama)

Conversation:

Language and Power

1. Frederick Douglass, from Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass (nonfiction)
2. Sandra Cisneros, No Speak English (fiction)
3. Ha Jin, Children as Enemies (fiction)
4. Mutabaruka, Dis Poem (poetry)
5. Kory Stamper, Slang for the Ages (nonfiction)
6. Firoozeh Dumas, Hot Dogs and Wild Geese (nonfiction)
7. Marjorie Agosin, English (poetry)
8. W.S. Merwin, Losing a Language (poetry)

Conversation:

Socially Networked

1. Clive Thompson, Brave New World of Digital Intimacy (nonfiction)
2. Sherry Turkle, from Alone Together (nonfiction)
3. Tim Egan, The Hoax of Digital Life (nonfiction)
4. Sherman Alexie, Facebook Sonnet (poetry)
5. Robbie Cooper, Alter Egos: Avatars and their Creators (photographs)
6. Alexis Madrigal, Why Facebook and Google's Concept of 'Real Names' Is Revolutionary (nonfiction)
7. Leonard Pitts, The anonymous back-stabbing of Internet message boards (nonfiction)
8. Jason Harrington, Do you Like Me? Click Yes or No (fiction)

　

Reading Workshop – Understanding Irony

Writing Workshop – Writing a Close Literary Analysis

　

10 – Utopia and Dystopia

What makes a perfect society? ● Why do utopias often become dystopias? ● How do we define "happiness"? ● In the future, will machines be a problem or a solution?

Central Text

Jamaica Kincaid, from A Small Place (nonfiction)

Conversation:

The Pursuit of Happiness

1. Ursula LeGuin, The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas (fiction)
2. Kurt Vonnegut, Harrison Bergeron (fiction)
3. Nikki Giovanni, Nikki-Rosa (poetry)
4. Jane Shore, Happy Family (poetry)
5. Pico Iyer, The Joy of Less (nonfiction)
6. Chinua Achebe, Civil Peace (fiction)
7. Wisława Szymborska, Utopia (poetry)
8. Jon Meachem, Free to Be Happy (nonfiction)

　

Conversation:

Our Robotic Future?

1. Isaac Asimov, Robot Dreams (fiction)
2. Margaret Atwood, Are Humans Necessary? (nonfiction)
3. Kevin Kelly, from Better than Human (nonfiction)
4. James Barrat, from Our Final Invention (nonfiction)
5. Rosa Brooks, In Defense of Killer Robots (nonfiction)
6. Richard Fisher Is it OK to torture or murder a robot? (nonfiction)
7. Arthur House, The Real Cyborgs (nonfiction)
8. Francis Fukuyama, Transhumanism (nonfiction)

　

Reading Workshop – Analyzing Diction and Tone

Writing Workshop – Writing a Rhetorical Analysis

　

Guide to Grammar and Style

Guide to Speaking and Listening

Guide to MLA Documentation Style

Glossary of Terms

Authors

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